In the recent years, so-called AmbiLight TVs have been introduced to the market. Such TVs include light sources arranged at the periphery of the TVs, which emit an ambience light onto the wall behind the TVs such that the emitted light matches the video being shown. The effect is larger virtual screen and a more immersive viewing experience.
The first generation of AmbiLight TVs required the AmbiLight system to be located near the edge of the TVs and pointing towards the wall next to the TVs. To reduce hotspot visibility, later on there was a move to keep this location but point them towards the wall behind the set and use reflectors to get the light on the wall next to the TVs. The internal arrangement of these components is such that an ambience light is emitted onto the wall behind the TVs.
FIGS. 1 a) and b) depicts graphically two variations of prior art AmbiLight TV's 104 placed at a distance d 18 from a wall 107 and comprise a thicker central section 11 at the back of the TV and a surrounding section 10. As shown here, the ambience lighting system 20 comprises a printed circuit board (PCB) 13, light emitting diode(s) (LED) 15 for emitting ambience light 16 on the wall 107, a reflector 14, an exit window 12 and an ambilight module 20 at the edge. All these components are integrated into the edge of the TVs.
Ultra thin TVs are now days becoming more and more popular. For several reasons this current approach as depicted in FIGS. 1a) and b) cannot be used in ultra thin TVs. The first reason is that positioning the light system at the edge of the TVs is obviously going to make the TVs edges thicker than TVs that do not have such AmbiLight system. Furthermore, when moving the set closer to the wall (which is preferred with thinner sets), the light path to the wall becomes shorter and shorter. This is conflicting with the required light path length when the number of light sources, e.g. LEDs, should not increase. Finally, moving the TVs closer to the wall reduces the possibilities of adding a reflector. As result of this, hotspot visibility will increase.